First, even one day of dictatorship is in direct violation of the Constitution.
Second, we're coming up on day 200 and the Trump administration continues to assert an expansive view of executive power far beyond any historical precedent and to degrade the systems designed to check that power, following a 100% run of the mill authoritarian playbook.
Still not correct.
What you trimmed off:
> Hannity: Under no circumstances, you're promising America tonight, you would never abuse power as retribution against anybody
> Trump: Except for Day One... look he's going crazy... Except day one.
> Hannity: Meaning?
> Trump: I'm going to close the border and we're going to drill, drill, drill
Update from day 199:
The border is closed (partially illegally) [1], US oil rigs are down [2], and he is in fact abusing power as retribution against dozens of people and institutions.
[1]: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/court-limits-trump-asylum-crack...
That's just part of the puzzle. What makes CPC different from most dictatorships is like NK or SU is that most of ruling elite of CPC is made up of engineers. Along with mandatory CPC ideology leaning, they also have notion that a developed nation is one that builds things. Bankers and Lawyers are ranked way down on power rankings.
On the other hand, most of American ruling elite are lawyers or bankers. So their worldview is mostly rule lawyering, interest earning, hedge fund etc.. Power brokers in these fields make the rules. Builders and engineers rank pretty low in power totem pole.
We forget these days that Chinese communism was a tire fire for the first half century. In 1990 China had the same per capita GDP (PPP) as India. Now China is 4x India.
This will happen sooner than you think if the US continues on its current path. Already Trump is asking for something similar for universities. He can use the same hammer for companies as well; deny them all government funding/contracts until they 'voluntarily' give in.
The 'c' word for this is not communism, but corruption. The special thing about corruption is that it can happen in any political 'ism'.
I don’t even know what to call someone who thinks the government should give private parties discretionary grants and contracts, but shouldn’t be able to use those to influence private actors. I’d call it libertarianism, but the principled libertarian would say we should abolish all funding to private universities.
The idea that the sovereign should be limited to follow law, due process, and the advice of experts in the administration of grants goes back at least to the magna carta and is so widespread that you would use a more specific term — a "constitutional monarchist", "republican", "democrat", or "democratic socialist", etc., would all agree on this point. The opposite point of view however, has a name — authoritarian — so you could call such a person "anti-authoritarian".
Due process protects rights and entitlements. Nobody has a right to receive discretionary government contracts or grants. To the extent we’re taking about preexisting contracts, the universities can sue to enforce whatever contractual rights they have. We have a robust system for recovering from the government for breaches of contract.
> and the advice of experts in the administration of grants
The “expert” stuff is the legacy of a scientific racist who didn’t trust democracy. It’s antithetical to democracy to suggest that the public should be forced to give discretionary grants and contracts to particular entities based on what “experts” think. Those experts are often themselves closely intertwined with the entities receiving the funding! They’re alums of Harvard, they met their spouse during grad school at Columbia, etc. They’ve got deep conflicts of interest.